iBanana2

New words of the day:

chuan2 shou1 di3 ya1 - ship mortgage
dan1 bao3 - guarantee
dai4 kuan3 xie2 yi4 - facility agreement
guan3 rang4 - assignment
dong3 shi4 hui4 jue2 yi4 - board resolutions
gong1 shi1 mi4 shu1 - company secretary

this HARD.

iBanana

iSinoGenius!!!!

Hurhurhur. Took my first ever call from someone in the PRC today who er doesn't speak English. Me, the banana. I didn't expect the call, in fact I told them I don't speak Mandarin. But anyway this chap calls me up and started blabbering in Mandarin. I managed to catch some of stuff he mentioned, so er I suppose I should consider it a success!

It didn't help that my boss' secretary was blaberring in English disturbing my brain conversion process - it was working at 120% converting all audio input in Mandarin into English to be stored in my brain but it was getting interference from the secretary. Bah. I kept waving at her to shut up but they couldn't stop giggling at my attempt to converse in Mandarin.

So anyway the conversation went somehow like this. I can't remember how it all went in Mandarin - it was kinda all stored in English in my brain.

him: "Wei, ni hao. Wo shi XXX I'm calling from Dalian regarding YYY. I'll be in Singapore tomorrow and I'd like to ask what time I should be at your office blah blah"

me: "uhm, liang dian ban".

him: "oh ok very good I'll be there then. Apart from the seal of the company, Do I need to prepare any wen2 jian4".

me thinking: knn. wtf is wen2 jian4. shit shit. I think it means contracts. ok. I think he needs to bring the corporate resolutions of the company.

me: "nin2 deng yi deng"

me to roommate: "how the hell do i say resolutions in Chinese?"

roommate: "uhm uhm...."

me to roomate: "god you suck"

me: "uhm...xu yao dai re1-so3-lu1-tions3". when in doubt, imitate the hongkies

him: "oh. hao hao. dunno what dunno wat prepared by the secretary, do you have the form of these resolutions?"

me to roommate, who is by now hysterical with laughter: "how do I say these are being prepared by XXX firm?"

roommate: "uhm, uhm"

I glare at roommate.

me: "uhm, xiang gang de lu shi yi jing zuo hao le"

roommate whispers: "it's zhun bei hao le!!!"

me sticks my third finger at roommate and mouth: "KNN WHY NEVER SAY EARLIER"

him: "oh ok. that's fine, so I'll see you tomorrow at 2.30 then"

me: "hao3, hao3, ming tian jian", and hurriedly pressed the "End call" button.

My roommate and the secretary are, by now, in stitches rollling on the floor.

So, in 12 hours time, I have to meet this Mr. xxx. My boss doesn't speak any Mandarin. I've dragged my roommate along who

shall be my translator. She sux though. She couldn't translate "how was the flight". Or are these Western forms of greetings.

I suppose I should ask if he's eaten.

Urgh.

I was telling my colleagues I felt completely emasculated in the sense that I'm unable to perform on demand. The feeling of helplessness sux.

Anyway, I figured out how to add music to my blog. So hurhur here's a Mongolian song to fit the post. Nevermind that it's completely unrelated. I like the tune. iBanana. Grant me some indulgence.

Pengerang et cetera

A bunch of us choir peeps planned to go to Pengerang on Sunday. At the designated time of 11 am, we all met at Changi POINT Ferry Terminal. Note to readers, Changi Ferry Terminal is NOT the terminal you go to go to Ubin / Pengerang - Mr TBoy ended up there and called up Ms. [insert flirtatious adjective of choice] sounding very lost. Mr. Haha K K then went to pick him up in his swanky Merc.

Note also: I can't believe nobody thought we needed Ringgit in MALAYSIA. Luckily I had a bunch of notes on me.

The journey across the straits was quite horrible and I felt ill, due in no small part to the fact that I *had* to read my Sunday newspapers. The journey was a torturous never ending 45 mins or so across choppy seas. I felt like an illegal immigrant and made sure i had my eyes on the lifejackets and those orange buoyancy ring device things (what do you call those orange tires?). The journey inland took another 20 solid mins. I was beginning to wonder if it was worth it.

When we got there, Mr. Korea started going on an ORDERING SPREE, peppered with comments of: "do we have enough food? do we have enough food? let's order more!". I was quite shocked at his appetite. Our menu:

1. buttered lobsters (Note to all bananas: long2 xia1 does NOT mean very big prawn)
2. steamed lobsters
3. chilli crab
4. brocolli and scallops
5. bamboo clams
6. drunken prawns
7. oatmeal prawns
8. wee bit of rice + lots of fluffy deep fried buns full of oily goodness.

I thought the food was not too bad - I've had better, but the place was better than the usual seafood joints. The bill came up to RM 330 - I'm glad there weren't anymore people who went, because we were flat out of money - I had about RM 20 left, so I think if another one went we may have had to wash dishes.

I'm not sure if I'll go back anytime soon - our total travelling time from the time I left home till the time i reached the ferry terminal again was some 7 hours, just for a lunch...

I guess it was more of the change of scenery and company that mattered.

As if we weren't pigs enough, we went to Plaza Singapura's Secret Recipe for dinner - 'cos I had a $30 voucher which had to be spent. I must say Secret Recipe's food and cakes are uhm...well...the recipes can remain secret for all I care. Very mediocre. There was a Diner's card promotion, if we signed up, we'd get a slice of free cake. So I made all the working people sign up - 4 free slices of cake, + my $30 voucher, dinner came up to a grand total of S$3.85.

As if we hadn't seen enough of each other yet (saturday choir, sun outing), we went to check out ACJC's choir concert on Monday. I was very impressed by their sound - the sops and altos were wonderful. the college tenors are a bit gross and the college basses lacked oomph. But the conducting left much to be desired - as someone said, you could substitute it for a metronome and you'd get the same effect. It totally spoilt my enjoyment of O Nata Lux and several other songs. Even with my eyes closed, I could literally hear every wave of her hand. She conducted every beat.

Their second half was much better than the first - as if they had found their voices - Kang Ding Qing Ge was fantastic as were most of the second half songs. If they had been conducted by Mr. God, they would be Singapore's super choir. Oh no. 8 more weeks to competition. Panic. So many things undone.

hurhur iPostCardHigh

Ok this is a really silly post. I promise I'll write more about the weekend gastronomic adventures of the Secret Seven (minus one) in Pengerang with pics and all, but for now hurhur iOnPostCardHigh.

I thought postcards I wasn't really a postcard person and that they are silly, but then I just got one in the post from Barcelona (although for some reason it was posted from ENGLAND...), and hurhurhur it lit up the beginning of my afternoon. hurhurhuhur. iPostCardHigh now.

More on Pengerang later haha. I still feel buttered lobsters crawling in my stomach.

I think I'm going mad from the noteworthying exercise. Dang dididi Dang dididi Dangdidi

Yesterday I dreamt I got smacked by my landlord's maid who thought she could smack me because I was going after her daughter. I remember in the dream I burst out laughing and said: "YOU THINK YOUR DAUGHTER DAMN HOT IS IT?!?!! FREAKING UGLY LAH". And then I proceeded to abuse the maid by sweeping all my pencil eraser droppings all over the floor for her to clean up. Strangely, this all took place at my home in Malaysia.

A few problems:

1. The maid doesn't have a daughter. She's younger than me. It's the landlord who has a daughter.

2. The landlord's daughter is fat and chao bin all the time. I can't stand the sight of her.

Dang dididiDang di di di di....exercitus....spi-iri.....tus.....

I can't get the sop line out of my head. I'm going nuts.

iDunGeddit

I dun get women. If A is not interested in B, why is A continuously pawing B like a kitten with a wool ball? Paw, paw, paw. Wool ball unravels and wraps itself round the kitten. More paw action. Until kitten + wool ball become completely tangled in a big mess. Isn't it tiring to keep pawing someone if you're not interested in that someone? Shrugs.

If I have to keep sending SMS i think i will die. so many buttons. so slow. Or is that the point? are some things meant to be savoured slowly. I guess I wouldn't know.

I have nothing to blog about, except that the instructor in the r@ffles gym spinning class is a masochist. How my colleague and I suffered today.

Hw@ Ch0ng Voices

Went to watch their performance today and was pleasantly surprised - their blend was quite good, strong voices throughout the sections and quite neat. Wonderful tenor solos. They've already memorized all their competition pieces, so er, we're kinda behind compared to them.

Their sleep was much better than the one I watched at the University of Sa1nt Th0mas choir performance last week (that one had no chords), but I wish they had done it a tad slower, and less stiff. Lux Aurumque was good as well.

We've got to buck up!!!!

However, their college choir left much to be desired. They were at least 2.5 times the size of the alumni, but sounded the same. Tenors were very weak (and gross) and sops had tons of split notes and they sounded shrieky. The sound was gross and blend was gross. They totally ruined my Remniscences of Hainan which is one of my favourite songs. Bin Nam Ma was gross. Ok everything was gross. They sang this horrible coconut song which got the audience laughing and my cringing on the edge of my seat. When the audience shouted encore at the end of the performance, the alumni didn't sing anything, but instead the college choir sang, and they sang that bloody coconut song again. I almost died, couldn't take it, and walked out after 5 bars of the encore coconut song. Shudder.

The audience must have been one of the worst I've ever had the misfortune of being with. People talking throughout, including during the songs, other people playing with plastic bags, having no regard for the people wanting to hear the choir, kids giggling and passing handphones, people taking flash photography (you think ur bloody 2 cm x 1 cm flash run by AA batteries powerful enough to illuminate the stage 10 metres away issit???!!? Please lah go back and study your inverse square law...knn). Bah. We need more audience control. I must have been spoilt by the Esplanade.

I have been living in denial. hurhurhur. sounds like coming out of the closet or something. It's closet related. it's my CHORALE TROUSERS. THEY DON'T FIT. Having spent the MOST UNCOMFORTABLE day last tuesday in them (of course, that was kind of expected), I finally came to the conclusion that: ok I need to tailor new ones. I thought I could like just lose a little weight and it'd all fit by Xiamen anyway. But hurhur, with 3 months to go, hurhur, making new pants is the faster solution. It's been said, there's no problem too big money can't solve. Hurhur. problem of chorale trousers solved.

It STILL doesn't solve the problem of how I'm going to not look pudgy in my Xiamen photos vis-a-vis Bremen photos. How. die. Photoshop.

The tailor was at our practice today, so I just asked to make some new pants. Bloody hell he damn insensitive lah. KNN taking my measurements then remarked: "your thighs are quite big". knn. thanks. If they weren't big I woudln't be making new pants. KNN KNN KNN. Think the comment was heard by some of the Altos who then gave me knowing looks. KNN again I say.

After practice we went to see Da Vinci Code - I forgot to jio the juniors now I feel guilty. Anyway I must have fallen asleep at least 5 times during the movie for like 5 mins on stretch. It felt like a rehash of the book. I FINALLY understand what the conclusion in the book was all about.

iMelancholic

Wikipedia: Melancholia (Greek μελανχολια) is a mood of non-specific depression. It is characterised by low levels of enthusiasm and low levels of eagerness for activity.

I feel somewhat melancholic right now. Unidentifiable, general melancholia. Combination of a somewhat mediocre performance at Esplanade just now, uncomfortable pants the whole day long, no lunch break, having to go back to office after the performance, and generally ruing the current state of life.

iKNN

i'm in SUCH a foul mood. tired and feel like a hippo in a tutu.

iKowtow

I kowtow to you, oh Master of the Art of Flirtation. Be thou mine guru, and I your indentured and humbled Servant!

hurhurhur!!! Some people are born good at somethings, and some people at other things. Flirting is obviously not one of my fortes.

PS I continue to leave my friends nameless and "boh miah" so as to retain some semblance of anonymity (spelling?!!?? sorry - iMalaysian), though any semblance of that must surely have been destroyed by my posting of the Ubin pics.

What a busy day what a busy day.

I just realised everytime I ask the auntie to buy me lunch so that I can plonk my ass in the office chair to work over lunch, and, er, do a spot of blogging, she always buys the same things: rice, tofu, fried chicken, cauliflower nuggets. I must have eaten this same lunch for the past 3 weeks, barring any trips out for lunch. I need a change. Tmr I tell auntie.

Stuffing my face on the packet of rice, I realised I am a rice whore. I must have rice. I had a vision of myself being miserable working in London munching on cold soggy sandwiches for lunch. Blech. I guess Asia's the place to be.

It's somewhat strange to me that it seems all women have an obsession someway or other to get married once they hit the ripe young age of 25, or, a little later on, an minor obsession with the details of the ceremony.

Quote 1 (Age 24): "This isn't about me and my little girl's dream of getting married" ==> little girls all dream of getting married.

Quote 2 (Age 25): "...for all the years the boyfriend and I have been together, we would end up as happily before the altar to recite our vows"

Quote 3 (Age 26): "Never mind that I booked Sheraton already, I'm going to see Ritz Carlton this weekend and their wedding dinner options. All I lose is the S$3,000 deposit at Sheraton, but if Ritz Carlton's the perfect place, well, it's the perfect place and S$3,000 is no biggie." ====> S$3,000!!!!!!!!! OMGGGGGGGGG

Mayhaps mine sample is too small.

It is 1 am. Mayhaps I am too free.

Tmr (or, rather, today) is going to be a longgggggggg day. I need another long weekend.

Quote of the weekend:

"Ok guys, you can stop fawning now!" - Mike in response to our subdued silence as Dawn paraded her red tango-like dress.

Hey we weren't fawning ok!!!!!!

It's really sad when a person chooses to commit suicide. Can things be so bad that they would rather be dead? What about the family. Sigh - my sympathies to the family.

Three chorale ppl and I went to watch the University of Saint Thomas Choir today perform. 2 hours+ of solid singing. Talk about value for money! Individually they were really superb singers (no surprise there, half of them are Voice majors...), and they did really well in songs with solos, or musicals - really superb. Certainly they did a lot better singing "I'm so Pretty" than the stupid West Side Story cast in Singapore who really quite sucked.

However, I thought they need to work on their blend and togetherness as a choir - in a lot of songs it just sounded very loud throughout, and because it's very vibrato-y, it sounded just like a wall of sound - I couldn't make out the chords. They also need to work on song movement - it was all very vertical, no horizontal - exemplified by their performance of Eric Whitacre's "Sleep", which really put me to sleep. Because of the way they sing, all those chord layerings didn't come through at all (i.e. note after note being layered one after another along the scale)

Anyway, quite enjoyable evening, at the expense of the queue of work waiting for me which I was supposed to have been doing instead. The Filipinos are really very expressive people / performers, and the crowd really took to them. I never saw such a big standing ovation before for any other choir. Almost the entire house gave them a standing ovation.

I just watched the Jasmine Women trailer. Zhang Ziyi really is very gorgeous.

A lot of songs have hidden meanings. Having watched Jasmine Women the other day, the song stuck in my head, and I went to download the lyrics, which, as translated, reads:

Beautiful Jasmine flower
Beautiful Jasmine flower
Blossoming and budding here and there,
Sweet-smelling and white, all declare
Let me pluck you with tender care,
And present your loveliness for all to share
Beautiful Jasmine flower

It didn't help that each time, Zhang Ziyi was singing it on her wedding night, so it kinda seems like the woman sings of er,

her beautiful "Jasmine flower", obvious reference to the act of deflowering there
blossoming, budding here and there - full womanhood
sweet-smelling and white - purity of the body
plucked and presented to someone else - ie surrender of the "flower" to the husband.

Folk songs should be rated RA.

How do I tell an employee that her feet stinks and smells like fermented chou doufu of the highest order of fermentation, and that she should never take off her shoes when I'm around, and that I feel like puking everytime I walk past her desk, made worse by the fact that she turns on the fan under her table which disperses the molecules so offensive to my olfactory senses and makes me nauseous.

How do I subtly hint so.

Argh. I want to go home.

My friend killed her cold-blooded fish. *shudder*....murderer.

 
 

Cool shit huh? 

Addendum: I forgot to mention my proudest achievement over the weekend! I drove a manual Kangoo all round Singapore! I thought it would be a complete bitch to drive, being manual and diesel and all, but it was surprisingly quite ok. Woohoo!!! I'm a driving master.

Makes me feel like buying a manual car.

God I don't feel like working. I'm still bushed from Ubin.

Pulau Ubin

This must be one of the more fun-filled Sunday's I've had in quite a while. The trip pretty much turned out perfect, except that the POSB atm didn't work, so half of us had no money.

Unfortunately I have no idea where I put my camera cable - I've got to go and find it so that I can send round pictures of the trip.

Right now my head's spinning a bit from the bumboat ride, and I keep smelling Off insect repellant everywhere I go.

We were meant to have met at 9 am, but by the time everyone got there, it was pretty much around 10 am. Had a leisurely breakfast and crossed over at 11 am or so. Rented some new mountain bikes - at S$6 for the entire day it was quite a steal. Cheap and fun way of bumming the day.

The track was quite difficult at some points, and MUDDY, but I'm proud to say that I think I'm one of the three people who escaped without a single mud stain. Owen, who was err dressed up to the nines, landed smack in the middle of a mud pool. Emma landed his foot in a puddle of water. Yenling got her feet half stuck in mud. Yuck.

The smell of Off! permeated the air, as SOME people diligently drenched themselves at EVERY PIT STOP with Off!

Lunch was Ham/Cheese sandwiches with PRINGLES, a taste which the Singaporeans and Korean did not take to. Baka. It's tasty ok. Drinks was Champagne and Hoegaarden. The Champagne was sour. Why Why Why???? But anyway quite an enjoyable and light lunch.

We ended about 4 pm, slacked till about 5 pm, and had dinner - pretty good value for money. Then we decided we wanted to go watch a movie, and I decided I had to see Zhang Ziyi in Jasmine Women, so off we went in Dawn's tiny Getz, the remaining 6 of us, unchanged, smelly (or, rather, smelling of Off).

I can't decide whether I like the show or not. I'm not really sure what the show was getting at, but for some reason or other, I like all these Chinese shows with idyllic backgrounds, speaking in authentic chinese - i.e. not catered for the Western palate like the nonsense of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. The show's set in Shanghai, and tells the story of 3 generations of daughters, who, for some reason or other, will start off young looking like Zhang Ziyi, and end off old looking like Joan Chen. I guess we are meant to pretend that they are different people.

I liked how we get to see Shanghai changing from 1927 (?) all the way to 1986. I think Shanghai must be a really beautiful city, and I can't wait to go there in July.

There's a really gross scene at the end where she's giving birth in the middle of the street, and it was so gross I could almost feel the pain of childbirth...it was erm, that vivid. I'm glad I'm a man and not a woman. It's no wonder some women just want to get anesthesised and get over with it.

Right. I'm totally bushed. My clothes are unironed, but I have enough work clothes for another week, so I'll just iron next week during the long weekend. My skin feels hot - I hope I didn't burn myself or anything.

EXCITING WEEKEND AHEAD

What an exciting weekend this is going to be!!!! A bunch of us are going to Pulau Ubin!!!! My virgin trip into the last vestiges of unchartered territory (errrr) in Singapore!!!! hurhurhhurhuruhrur

I think I'm neurotic.

How can I not be amused when my staff consistently mispronounces the name "Marianna" to "Marinara".

As in: "I've asked Marinara to go do xxxxx". "Marinara is sick today." "Marinara is going to get the cheque".

I've been sniggering to myself the whole morning. I wonder how Marinara feels.

So much work. So little motivation to do them. How. Methinks me needs a pay raise to remotivate me.

Me is on a quest to lose 15 kg by July so that me is not looking pudgy when I compare my Bremen photos with my Xiamen photos. How is that going to be achieved I wonder hurhurhur.

iFat.